Glass Eyes
by Desdemona Kakalose
Summary: Tell us, Devi. What's it like dating a serial killer?


**Glass Eyes**

"Unfortunately, love doesn't necissarily make one happy."

* * *

Devi told herself it was all right.

He loved her, after all. He loved her. No one had ever loved her before, not really. Wasn't that good enough? Shouldn't she be happy with just that? It was something she'd never expected to get, after all.

So she pretended not to see the bloodstains on his clothes, still fresh and red when he came to pick her up, or see the way that clerks and ticket takers looked at him with depthless horror. They didn't know, they didn't understand. They hadn't seen him cry at night, or sat beside him on the hood of his car, staring into the night sky.

They hadn't seen all of him the way she had. They only saw the boots and the coat and the knives, and her… on his arm… eyes dim and motions jerky, like some kind of badly used child's puppet with glass eyes.

He never hit her.

He never hurt her at all. He loved her. He only smiled like that when he was with her, and he treated her like a princess, the way every woman dreams of being treated.

And their almost-kisses were more beautiful than any of the intimate things she'd done with all the men she'd ever dated. It was alright that he never touched her, never held her hand or hugged her when she was afraid. It was alright that his fingers only ghosted over the whiteness of her cheek, protected by gloves and leaving trails of red across her face.

He told her that she was beautiful. Devi had never been beautiful before. The first time he said that, she had wanted nothing more than to kiss him, to pay him back for something so unexpected, so wonderful. And then he had tried to kill her.

She knew now, that it had been the highest form of complement he could give her. It was his equivalent of a wedding vow, or a night alone under the stars on the blanket her aunt had sewn, and all that entailed. It was alright that his most beautiful complement had been to want her dead.

He'd never do that now.

So it was alright, she told herself. The people he killed deserved it. He never killed anyone without a reason. It was alright, alright because he was justified, wasn't he? They'd provoked him, they'd done this to him, it was alright…

One of her coworkers asked her if she was okay. Did she have a boyfriend? Was he treating her well?

She'd laughed. Oh god, she'd laughed until her ribs hurt, and the worried coworker had backed away and left, and she still laughed, even though there was nothing funny about it.

He treated her like a _queen_. Like a _Goddess_. He left still warm, bleeding hearts on her doorstep for Valentines Day. He brought her rings and jewelry taken from the hands of murdered women, women who might have been her if she hadn't been working in the book store on just the right day.

No, no, that was wrong. He wouldn't have hurt her. She wouldn't have done anything and Nny never killed people who didn't deserve it. They all did something to him, he told her so.

A lot of the time, she came home and only sat on the edge of her bed, staring into the darkness for hour on hour. She couldn't remember how it came to this. He made her promises, he gave her gifts, he said that he loved her, and God, she couldn't leave after that…

He liked to take her places. To the top of that cliff, to the movies, to dinner, for walks under the moonlight… he never took her places in the daylight. He called at two AM, and dutifully she picked up and listened as he pulled the night out from under her, refused her the sleep her body craved.

She didn't need it, he said. Sleep was for the weak, and she wasn't weak. She was beautiful.

Sometimes, she saw herself as a porcelain doll, with hollow eyes and a painted smile, luminescent white skin. The doll looked through you, and the child toted it along everywhere, adoring it, heedless of the cracks forming in its flawless face. The fingers snapping off one by one…

It was alright. He loved her. Other girls dreamed of such a devoted, gentle lover. She had one.

She was hungry most of the time. Hungry and tired. Nny said it made her beautiful, made her stronger, despite her desperately weak knees and shaking hands. But he said so, and Nny was always right.

Right?

He took her back to his place, sometimes, and she caught her reflection in his shattered mirrors as they walked down the halls. She wasn't scared. He'd never hurt her. He loved her. Sometimes he would collapse on the couch and sob into her shoulder, recounting things she couldn't understand, refusing to let her hold him because he hated touch… and she would see her shattered reflection, and wonder if that moon-white ghost woman could really be her, and then she would catch a streak of vivid red on her reflection's cheek… and know it was.

It didn't matter if the sun was dimming day by day, or that she was seeing impossible patterns swirling in the sky when he took her to the cliff to stargaze, or that Tenna was refusing to talk to her until she 'snapped out of it', or that she'd caught herself crying for no reason last night, just laying in the darkness for hours, eyes wet.

She loved him of course. The little porcelain doll cannot help but love the child who breaks its fingers one by one, who shatters its glass eyes. All a toy ever wants is to be loved. There's no way back now, and she wouldn't have the strength if there was. She's so tired, so hungry.

And he loves her. He's a murderer, a criminal, and once upon a time she hated him with a feverous passion, and the world turns away from him as he weeps into her shoulder, refusing to be comforted, and he tells her things, sometimes, that make her violently sick as soon as he leaves…

But he loves her.

So it's alright.

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End file.
